


desiderium: the five stages of grief

by summerela



Category: NCT (Band)
Genre: Blood, Death, Delusions, Depression, Family, Friendship, Gen, Oh yeah..., Old Age, Soulmates, Violence, there is a lot going on in this but nothing very graphic
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-10-23
Updated: 2019-10-23
Packaged: 2020-12-29 00:06:51
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,201
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21145469
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/summerela/pseuds/summerela
Summary: Jisung experiences gain and loss. And he grows up.(a metaphorical work, lots of easter eggs)





	desiderium: the five stages of grief

**Author's Note:**

> hi guys, I wrote this one in a night because I had a lot going on in my head and in life. It gives me some closure about death. I took the idea and spun it with Dream's concept of graduation. I hope you enjoy.
> 
> Also, because there's a lot of sad and heavy concepts (though not depicted very graphically), I place this warning beforehand. Please don't comment if you have nothing nice or thoughtful to say, I've never tackled something like this before and this is definitely out of my comfort zone.
> 
> But by all means, I hope you also gain some closure after reading this. Despite everything. Thank you!

_Stage 1: denial_

The air is somber and still, muffled by the eulogy spoken in a steady stream by the priest. It’s in Korean and English, a request put in to pay its respect to both halves of the deceased body in front of them. Jisung feels numb, but it’s not from the cold.

It’s December. In the dead of winter. When a freak accident took his friend. Jisung moves closer to the shivering yet stone blank-faced boy next to him—a third of their friend trio but now forever a duo because their friend was gone.

He can’t believe he’s gone.

The ceremony ends and Jisung is pushed towards the casket. He can’t see the lifeless body, and he doesn’t know if he’s thankful or not for that. He bows his head and thinks about how the world still spins and revolves around the sun, how someone can be laughing in this moment in another part of the world.

The Chinese boy next to him doesn’t move when it’s his turn to approach the coffin. Jisung looks at his older friend, watches how the bright red hair is the only vibrant source of color amidst the black and white and muted tones of dread.

The other takes a step towards the coffin, but stops and suddenly turns around and runs.

Jisung wants to run after him but his parents hold him back, and he can only look on helplessly.

It’s been a week since Jisung has seen his best friend. He even misses the snaggletooth grins and the headlocks he’ll get put into for being a cheeky brat. People can mourn for as long as a year. Jisung wonders why he’s stopped mourning so soon. It doesn’t feel right, but time wouldn’t stop for him and he can’t stay holed up in his room forever.

He asks his mom if he can go visit the other, and his mom lets him go with a sad smile on her face. Jisung brings with him a thermos of hot tea, not exactly sure if it’ll do anything for the situation but he hopes it’ll at least make his friend feel better.

When he arrives to the worried looks of the other’s parents, he feels a part of his heart sink. Their murmurs of how their son hasn’t left his room for days, how he’s barely eating, how he isn’t talking when they knock on his door to check if he’s alright, all meld into this heavy stone that drags Jisung’s spirit and hopes down into the outside snow with it.

Jisung walks up the stairs, fearing it would be for the worst but when he knocks on the door and makes a noise to tell the other it’s him, he hears a faint response.

He enters the dark room and sees his friend lying on the bed staring up at nothing.

Jisung doesn’t know what to say. He lies down quietly next to the other, stares up at the ceiling with him. An hour passes, maybe two. He’s only aware it’s night time when his parents call him, asking when he’s coming back home for dinner.

The Chinese boy hasn’t moved, and Jisung leans in and kisses him on the cheek. In assurance, in sorrow. There isn’t a word for the grief he feels.

As he walks home that day, a part of him feels like it has died back there with the lifeless, yet still-breathing boy.

He’s coming home the next day when he gets the call. Jisung barely comprehends the words.

_Denial. Couldn’t make sense of what was real. Frozen to death in the dead of night._

Jisung hangs up the call abruptly, in the midst of his mom crying. He runs like a madman to the park, trying to make sense of what his parents were telling him.

He stops.

There’s an imprint of a body in the snow, right beside the tree the three of them used to climb as kids. Jisung can’t bring himself closer than a feet before it, as he sees the outline and realizes that it’s a curled up, fetal imprint of a body.

The physical body isn’t there anymore but Jisung knows. He knows the fate that befell his friend and he sinks into the snow as tears fall down his face.

When his parents find him, he doesn’t speak. When the funeral comes for the boy who was in shock and denial over his recent friend’s passing, Jisung doesn’t think.

The only thing that continues as the world remains moving are the tears falling down his face.

They never stop.

\-----

_Stage 2: anger_

Jisung has never felt as close to his older brother as his friends do to their siblings. He wonders if it’s his fault his older brother doesn’t treat him to ice cream or tease him fondly or put him into headlocks, as others do. His brother, who wears a grim expression, and has hair that’s rebelliously bleached almost to a white color, barely speaks to him. And when he does, it’s to the point and never about Jisung’s feelings.

It’s why Jisung doesn’t think about seeking out the older when he starts getting bullied at school.

He’s a high schooler and he doesn’t understand how teens can still be so immature over differences and opinions. Just because Jisung is a dancer, practices various styles – some unconventional and others not fitting his image, doesn’t mean he warrants this kind of treatment.

But in society that values the familiarity and assumptions of what’s appropriate, Jisung knows he’s drawn the short end of the straw since the beginning.

One day, Jisung gets home with a sharp bruise on his side. He hobbles up the stairs but freezes when he hears one of the bedroom doors slam open.

It’s his brother in a muscle tee, with his gym bag, on his way to work out. Jisung looks down at his own lanky body, wills himself to form a six-pack but when he tries to clench his abdominal muscles, the contraction prods at his forgotten bruise and he winces.

His brother stares at him questioningly, some foreign emotion flitting across his sharp eyebrows. But it disappears just as he does, bounding down the stairs and past Jisung.

No words are exchanged, but it’s for the best. Jisung’s not sure how he can maintain a straight face when his sides hurt so much.

When night falls and he skips dinner so as to not arouse the suspicions of his parents, only downing a cup of warm tea, Jisung hears the door next to his room close, a sign that the older boy was home. It’s almost like they live in separate worlds and Jisung has no means of understanding his brother.

That night, he sleeps in pain.

They’re at it again. The bullies. Jisung has stupidly walked into this one, not having checked his surroundings when he found himself cornered by the parking lot of his high school. The emptiness of the lot draws a shiver down his back, as the sun is setting and most of the staff and teachers have left.

He’s able to block the incoming swing, earning himself a staggering step backwards and a hurt forearm. Somewhere, he’s losing blood. Jisung can feel it, the wetness seeping into his clothes, but for some reason the bullies don’t seem so happy, as they start to get closer. Aiming now for his kneecaps.

His legs. The most precious part of him.

The scream gets caught in his throat as Jisung sees the impending blow, the hit that would end his dance career.

But a flash of black sails into his bleary vision and he hears the grunts of different voices, people who aren’t him who live their lives with different opinions, now getting beaten up by Jisung’s savior.

Jisung doesn’t realize he’s fallen to the ground, clutching his knees as he shakily looks up to see who has stepped in and sent the bullies running.

It’s his brother. Staring at him with anger in his eyes, cracked lips and bleeding knuckles.

“Hyung?” He whispers out. The word is foreign on his tongue as disuse has almost allowed it to fade from Jisung’s vocabulary.

His brother kneels down in front of him and starts shouting at him, asking him why he didn’t tell him he was getting bullied, why he kept his problems to himself.

Jisung gives him a tiny smile, the loss of blood now making his head feel woozy. He can barely discern that same look on his brother’s face, the one he had seen earlier in the week.

_Concern_.

“I have you now…hyung.”

He faints.

When Jisung comes to, he’s laying on his back in his brother’s bed, patched up and in an unbearable amount of pain. His parents aren’t home yet but his brother, where was he?

He barely makes out the note on his desk, the one that’s on a glaringly bright yellow post-it. It says that the other is out, taking care of business, but that he’ll be back soon – and no, Jisung is to not move, not until he was back.

Jisung figures his brother was running errands, was in the midst of going somewhere when he saved Jisung from the bullies. He winces as he tries to get up and out of bed, blatantly ignoring his brother’s wishes (it’s probably somewhere in his blood to be slightly defiant) and goes down to the living room to check the news and pass time in wait.

He sees a flash of bleached white hair on the screen and suddenly it feels like the temperature of the room has dropped twenty degrees.

_“Reports say that a young man, about age twenty, was fatally injured at the hands of a neighborhood gang. We do not know if he has any connections to this infamous gang, but police have detained the attackers — boys who are seniors at the local high school. The conditions of the young man are not good, he —”_

The home phoneline rings and Jisung doesn’t feel anything as he picks it up.

“Hello? Is this the Park residency? This is the hospital of…” Jisung tunes out the words. He hears his brother’s name, hears the words _lost too much blood, has only eight minutes to live_.

Jisung hangs up and falls to the ground. The hospital personnel is probably calling his parents now, but it’s too late. He can’t make it in time, he can’t do anything.

He lays down on the floor, curls up into a fetal position, and lets the sobs come and wrack his body, feeling the pain his brother must’ve felt on his behalf in his last hour of living.

\-----

_Stage 3: bargaining_

“I believe the right word for that is ineptitude, hyung.” Jisung says teasingly as he and his favorite person in the world, his hyung by two years, swing by their local convenience store to grab snacks during break for their late night practice.

The other snorts, grabbing a bag of sweets that has the caricature of a cartoon face with strong eyebrows. It’s an odd mascot for a childhood snack, but Jisung doesn’t think too much about it. Food is food.

The cashier rings up their purchases in record time and the two of them make their way back to the training building.

When the other isn’t looking, Jisung jabs out a hand and tickles his hyung’s side, avoiding the abs the other has developed because Jisung knows attempting to tickle the stomach would only result in failure. In response, the other shrieks in giggles, evening lamplight catching his reddish-brown hair and making the chilly autumn night seemingly more warm than it actually was.

They make it back before break is over and their coach scolds them for wandering around like lost souls during that fifteen minutes, turning a blind eye to the plastic bag of snacks. Jisung wonders what kind of metaphor that even means, but he supposes old age certainly makes one speak in riddles.

Jisung gets into training, steeling his nerves and drawing calm into his body. He may still be the lanky boy he was at age eighteen, but now fast forward and at age twenty-five, he has finessed his body to be as fit as possible: believing in the virtue of protecting others and himself.

He hears the telltale grunts of his hyung who also doubles as his sparring partner, as the latter aims at the mock fixtures put in place to facilitate their training. With his index finger, he coaxes the other to participate in a match with him.

When Jisung gets home that night, his body is sore but his spirits are up. He’s positive about the present, he’s happy about his growth.

The next time he has training, he almost laughs out loud at his hyung’s full-blue assemble.

“Why are you like this hyung?” He asks, snickering when the other rolls his eyes and sticks his hands into the pockets of his overall jeans. The other doesn’t have the opportunity to retort, not when their coach tells them they only have ten minutes to get ready for training.

Training is tiring that day, Jisung fathoms it’s the toll taken on his body for having not rested well the few days before. His partner seems to still have energy, even managing to land a hit on his forearm when Jisung isn’t looking.

Jisung scowls when the timer is up, indicating their sparring match is over.

When they’re getting ready to leave, his hyung sidles up to him in apology, saying he’ll treat Jisung to some ice cream tonight for landing the victory hit. Jisung pretends his pride isn’t hurt but he takes the offer and lets his hyung drag him by the hand to their usual convenience store.

Picking snacks is never a question to Jisung, as he gets his mind lost in the different flavors displayed on the shelves. The older is similarly examining what to get, scrolling up results on his phone.

Jisung’s in the middle of thinking of trying something new when he hears a crash near the cash register. He doesn’t seem to mind the noise, but his hyung pockets his phone and tells him to wait, he’ll go check on it.

It’s been a minute and his hyung hasn’t returned. Tired and grumpy from an exhausting practice, Jisung pulls the gray hoodie around himself tighter as he tries to peer around the corner. He stares when he sees two masked men with knives holding the cashier hostage.

His hyung.

His brave, strong hyung with a heart of wit and compassion.

“Let’s settle this calmly. No need to put anyone in danger.”

Jisung hears his hyung say and he stares at the former as he walks up to the men and quietly tells them to put their knives down. It turns for the worst when, his hyung, having taken one step closer in hopes of alleviating the situation, is grabbed by one of the burly men and is now shoved to the floor.

Jisung watches in horror as the other’s head hits the counter as his body goes down. The blood from the head wound now flowing heavily onto the floor. Jisung lightly gasps, but it’s the cashier screaming as she witnesses the blood that covers up the small noise Jisung makes and snaps him out of his shock. On autopilot, Jisung starts dialing the ambulance.

But when he looks up, his hyung is staring back at him with intent, from the floor, with his eyes now losing its liveliness.

Years of training together wasn’t supposed to lead him up to this moment, of reading the other’s small gestures and realizing it’s the opposite of what Jisung wants to do.

With a silent sob, he dials the police, fingers still hovering over the dial pad, over the ambulance’s number. The pool of red around his hyung darkens.

He doesn’t register when the police arrive, nor how the burglars are quickly captured and taken away. He can only watch from his hiding spot as the light slowly disappears from his hyung’s eyes.

Someone, probably the ambulance, has arrived. But it’s too late. Jisung watches on as they carry out the body.

His muffled sobs are the only small noise in the convenience store that night.

\-----

_Stage 4: depression_

The first thing Jisung sees when he opens his eyes is how blue his surroundings look. The shades are varying. This is a weird dream, Jisung thinks, perhaps the overtime he was putting in at his nine-to-five, monotonous office job is finally getting to him.

The atmosphere is somber, almost as if it were dredged up from some place deep within him.

To be honest, he doesn’t know where he was before now.

He moves around in that space of no end, hoping to find another lost soul who is wandering around just like him. It is to his luck that he does feel a presence. Rather than fear the unknown, he feels the budding sense of relief—that someone, anyone, was there with him.

An entity materializes before him.

“Jisung-ah.”

He knows that’s his name. His birth into this void at least began with the existence of his name.

“Who are you?”

The entity chuckles and the silhouette becomes clearer. A man, probably in his thirties, not that far off from Jisung’s age, is smiling benignly at him. His hair is a soft pink but everything else about him, from the sad eyes to the clothes, exudes despair and despondency.

Yet he smiles. Just for Jisung.

“My child, you have arrived.”

He squints his eyes in confusion but the man laughs morosely. He doesn’t answer Jisung’s earlier question, simply raises an index finger and coaxes Jisung to follow him in his walk towards nowhere. Jisung has no one else to trust in this dream so he answers the beckoning and walks beside him.

“Why is everything so sad here?”

The silence is constricting and Jisung feels overwhelming waves of grief wash over him repeatedly as the shade of blue around them turns darker.

“You are longing for something.” Are the only words he gets in response as they venture into the darkest of blues. A black-like void of nothing.

Like a torrential wave, the crushing feeling hits him and Jisung chokes on his involuntary tears. Nothing in his body is listening to him and he lets the tears stream down freely.

They stop walking, but it feels more like something within Jisung’s emotions make them stop.

The man is no longer smiling, only looking back at him with the same sad eyes.

“I have lived so long, here alone, while my friends were out there.”

Friends? Who? Jisung wants to ask these questions but he can’t, not when he can’t stop crying. The man understands, holding a hand out and lets Jisung clasp it tightly in his.

“But you’re here now.”

Jisung tries to smile, but it comes out more as an ugly grimace amidst the snot and waterworks .

“Time doesn’t allow for more than one entity to subsist in this void. Your time here is short, fortunately, but mine is dwindling. Our overlap was never meant to be long.” The man continues cryptically, now looking fondly at Jisung.

His crying stops. As if there was an internal faucet that shut off on its own accord.

Jisung blinks through the remnants of his last tears when he realizes the other is holding before him a bouquet of forget-me-nots.

“Take these before I disappear.”

Jisung looks at him in alarm, “Disappear? What do you mean?” His words trail off when he realizes the other is starting to disappear. He lunges forward and grabs the flowers, watching as the darkness surrounding them start lightening up—the black shade of the void reverting to a dark blue, to a cerulean, to a sky-blue, and then finally white.

The other man is but a faint shadow before Jisung, but he no longer holds the same somber lines of before. Instead, a peaceful smile befits his lovely lips. Jisung doesn’t know what comes over him but he takes a step forward and hugs the faint ghost of the entity.

“Good luck, Jisung-ah.”

He disappears.

\-----

_Stage 5: acceptance_

“Time sure does fly, doesn’t it?”

Jisung sits down slowly into his chair, maneuvering the body that was once able to stomach more physical activities like roller coasters (courtesy of his best friend). Except now, his body isn’t as flexible as it used to be, and he takes his time in paying his usual visit to his good ol’ buddy.

The old man lying on the bed before him coughs lightly, but it’s not from sickness – old age, afterall, has multiple manifestations.

The sun is bright today, casting a warm glow through the windows into the room of the retirement home. Any other day, Jisung would’ve taken the other outside to sit in the gardens and joke around about the other residents. But today, his friend requested they stay inside. Saying something about his bones aching and how Jisung may be one year younger and still have more vigor, but maybe today isn’t the day to be outside.

Jisung at least remembers to grab a handful of forget-me-nots before coming over to visit the other, having arranged them earlier by the bedside.

They are a lovely shade of blue.

Jisung looks at his friend and they share a smile. How funny that time passes by in the blink of the eye, and suddenly you’re looking back on your years of living. The highs and lows, the familiar faces, the emotions you experienced in one lifetime.

“I can still rap, you know. Time hasn’t changed that.” His soulmate says begrudgingly through the contemplative silence, and Jisung chuckles.

“Right. Still trying to be the hip grandpa for your grandchildren.” Jisung has turned the other way, to admire the view from their window. 

He knows the other is looking smug. He doesn’t have to read between the wrinkles and lines on his best friend’s face to know what kind of look he’s sporting.

With a sigh, Jisung looks wistfully out the window. It seems lately, they’ve been spending more time in reflection than in talk. He doesn’t mind though.

“I’m proud of you Jisungie.”

This prompts Jisung to look back, noticing that even at an astounding age of more than ninety, his soulmate can still act youthful.

“We’ve come a long way. Since that time we bumped into each other at that performance. Only to meet again a few years down the line.” The other holds out a hand and Jisung doesn’t hesitate to take it. “We’ve been through the good and the bad together. Conquered the world, I shall say.” He coughs and Jisung frowns. That didn’t sound like the usual cough.

“Do you want some water?” The other waves him off.

“Don’t bother with that. The faucet in this room needs repairing anyways. It never seems to turn on when I want it too.” Jisung keeps that in mind, remembering to file in a complaint. He turns his attention back to his friend.

“Thank you for being the godfather to my children, and then the grand godfather to my grandchildren.” The other continues, gripping Jisung’s hand a bit tighter. But not tightly enough, Jisung realizes belatedly, the strength leaving his soulmate as something else comes to claim him instead.

“Thank you for being my friend, Jisung. I’ll never have a friend like you again.”

Those are the last words Jisung hears as the hand in his goes limp and his best friends passes away silently and peacefully on that quiet, warm afternoon.

He leans down slowly and places a gentle kiss on the hand that’s rapidly losing its warmth. And with closure, he presses the button, watching as the staff comes in and collects his soulmate’s body, departing with understanding looks on their face.

Jisung cries a little, but they’re not out of sorrow.

They’re the tears of a life having lived. In remembrance of all of those before him.

\-----

_Now:_

Jisung wakes up. It’s a new day, the sun has barely risen. There’s a sense of calm within his heart, but he feels somewhat a bit drained, as if he’s waking up from several lifetimes.

His phone beeps, and it’s a message from his manager, telling him he has about an hour to get ready for his next schedule.

With a loud unhindered yawn, Jisung stretches in bed and closes his eyes. Five faces, vaguely familiar, flash before him. But then when he opens his eyes, he loses that small thread of thought.

As he gets ready for the day, he feels his eyes getting drawn back to the shelf by the wall, where he keeps things of inexplicable value to him:

A Moomin plushie.

His first gaming mouse.

A Michael Jackson LP record.

An old camera.

And finally a box of little trinkets containing miscellaneous items like keyrings, domino blocks, etc.

He doesn’t know why he has the urge to admire that shelf. Maybe it’s a gut feeling. But he feels like he’s going to do great today.

**Author's Note:**

> I hope things make sense! If they don't, I'll consider putting up an extra chapter explaining everything.
> 
> "Death will never make sense to your mind. Only time and self-understanding will alleviate your suffering."  
-Maxime Lagacé


End file.
